End of the Year Odds and Ends
Today is the last day of 2008 and I have not finished all I had intended to do this year. There’s one lovely Miconia, in particular, that will have to wait until next year for its write-up.
Others have not been so remiss, and I’d like to point you to the current Berry Go Round – Issue #12 – that’s being hosted at Foothills Fancies. Plenty of good reading about plants, nicely put together.
Way back at Thanksgiving this year, the Trees, Climate and People blog posted their botanical guide to Thanksgiving dinner. It’s a list of 42 plants with their common names, their scientific names and families, and the dish(es) they appeared in. I missed it at the time, but I love the concept and am passing it along in case you’re interested in compiling your own botanical guide to any holiday meal.
John Bennett sent a message about the tree known in Panama as algarrobo. There’s a town named Algarrobos on the road that goes from Dolega to David, and I’ve been meaning to stop there and look around, assuming I’ll find some of those trees. They’re probably also here in Potrerillos, but I thought my chances of actually encountering one would be better in a town named after them.
Here’s what John had to say back on December 8, 2008:
“Dry season or our winter is almost here, time to shed leaves and prepare for the dry spell. Unless you happen to be an “algarroba” tree. Or Hymenaea courbaril L. – Family: Fabaceae-caesalpinioideae – Sinonims: Nombres Comunes: Algarrobo, algarroba, guapinol, in which case you simply change to dry season leaves, which I suppose have less stomata and therefore loose less H2O.
“As you can see, the leaves are turning brown and soon they will all rain down on us and the tree will bring forth new green leaves, as if it were spring. In spring it will do the same.”
The Wikipedia article refers to the tree as Jatobá. Thanks, again, John, for your contribution and your interest.
Another project that has been swallowing a lot of time is the installation of a weather station and the putting together of a web site to publish the data. The installation went smoothly, but right now I’m waiting for an adapter that will let me plug the radio receiver into the USB port on my computer. While waiting, I’ve been fiddling with the web site, so I hope that by the time the part arrives, I’ll be able to get the weather data online very quickly.
So, on this last day, may I wish you a prosperous and peaceful New Year, and may we all be just as productive as we’d like to be!
[...] reported in December that the algarrobo tree was preparing for the dry season by changing to brown dry season leaves which he assumed had fewer stomata and therefore would lose less water than the green leaves. Here [...]
[...] from John’s earlier message: The algarrobo tree prepares for the dry season by changing to brown dry season leaves which presumably has fewer stomata and therefore would lose less water than the green leaves. Here [...]